assigning proper scores to actions would require some advanced statistical tracking and analysis. it'd probably have to be one of those community things.
If we're talking about the value of scoring in general, why not re-evalute the model to produce scores which are more readily useful? People point to the K:D ratio as some indicator of skill, but the problem is it doesn't quantify -what- skill is being shown. If you're a gorge and your K:D ratio shows 10:1, it's probably because you placed your hydras well and healed them often. If it's a marine, it could be good aim - or it could be that you're good at hiding behind other meatshields and finishing off wounded skulks.
I'd propose a few categories, such as:
- Builder (somehow related to seconds spent building structures, and structures completed) - Attacker (related to how many direct kills you got by yourself, or perhaps more related to accuracy) - Support (related to how many kill assists you got, perhaps also seconds spent welding / repairing or healing as gorge) - Scout (related to how many meters you physically moved, or rooms you visited, or something that shows you are good at keeping moving)
The tf 2 score system is retarded and i can only se players wont to get rid of k/d fore not getting players tell that you suck etc when you have a bad game. This shouldn't be a reason to remove k/d how about kick/don`t play whit retarded players :)
i am not a score ###### but i wont to now what god i have done in a game and compared to my team/enemy team..
And on some pub server it help to make some team so its not one team lose all the time :)
<!--quoteo(post=1939483:date=May 28 2012, 08:25 AM:name==Mr.P=)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (=Mr.P= @ May 28 2012, 08:25 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939483"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The tf 2 score system is retarded and i can only se players wont to get rid of k/d fore not getting players tell that you suck etc when you have a bad game. This shouldn't be a reason to remove k/d how about kick/don`t play whit retarded players :)
i am not a score ###### but i wont to now what god i have done in a game and compared to my team/enemy team..
And on some pub server it help to make some team so its not one team lose all the time :)<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
yo why don't you fix your spelling and grammar before you go around calling people retarded, mmk?
Score is relatively arbitrary and people need to understand that. High KDRs are generally good for the team, low KDRs are generally bad for the team. This does not mean that a high KDR player is better than a low KDR player because KDR doesn't take into account many factors that win games (like scouting, killing RTs, communicating pushes, etc).
That said, a good scoreboard should have:
Score (arbitrary based on various metrics such as damage to buildings, damage to players, buildings destroyed, lifeforms/players killed, etc) Kills (very important, despite some people apparently thinking they're meaningless) Deaths (not as important, but more information is never bad)
Do not remove kills and deaths from the scoreboard. That's incredibly casual nonsense for a supposedly skill-based FPS game.
puzlThe Old FirmJoin Date: 2003-02-26Member: 14029Retired Developer, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, Constellation
edited May 2012
I think kills, deaths and points are essential in a shooter, but I'm not convinced they need to be on the score screen during the game.
The purpose of the points should be to motivate correct behaviour - be that killing enemies, not dying, building rts, killing rts, healing etc.
During the course of a round the only thing that ideally would be displayed is score - the aggregate of everything you did to contribute to the benefit of your team.
At the end of the round, a very detailed breakdown of every player's stats should be displayed to allow people to understand what they contributed on an individual level and to feel that they are making progress on areas they personally care about.
Having said that, I'd much prefer the current system than removing k:d ratio completely.
Points have more importance than simply encouraging people to do the right things (ie killing stuff or building stuff). I personally use them to tell how the game is going, who is winning, and who is losing. If I see that four of my six players on my team haven't gotten a single kill, then I know that I have to play defensive and protect our RTs because the rest of my team sucks. Or I may go lerk in this game to provide some more firepower early on because it is clear (from the scoreboard, kills, and deaths) that my team is losing early game. If you take away the scoreboard (and some of the asinine ideas like removing kills/deaths) during the game, then it suddenly becomes much harder to evaluate even your own team's performance.
Bad players treat score, kills, and deaths as a goal. Good players use score, kills, and deaths as information.
puzlThe Old FirmJoin Date: 2003-02-26Member: 14029Retired Developer, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, Constellation
edited May 2012
But why include kills and deaths and not other important concepts like the number of rts saved, which is arguably, much more important a metric.
When you drill down into what makes a good NS player there are far too many stats to display on the scoreboard. The critical requirement is to have a very sophisticated scoring system that can measure concepts like assisting a commander in building an RT ( e.g. you were within X distance of the RT when combat occured and an rt was successfully built ). With a well designed system you can have an aggregate score that more accurately reflects what a useful team member does and k:d ratio then becomes less important. This is probably not achievable within the timeframe of NS2 1.0 but I guess what I would like to see is a mechanism that makes k:d redundant as a useful metric during the game.
Not FlayraJoin Date: 2012-05-18Member: 152282Members
<!--quoteo(post=1939520:date=May 28 2012, 10:18 AM:name=GORGEous)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (GORGEous @ May 28 2012, 10:18 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939520"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Do not remove kills and deaths from the scoreboard. That's incredibly casual nonsense for a supposedly skill-based FPS game.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> I love how you build that it's purely a rough informational metric, then express how NOT having it is 'casual', effectively calling anyone who doesn't see KDR as a valid/important metric (which it isn't) an unskilled casual (or noob). Effectively destroying the (mock?) argument you'd made, leading up to that point.
Given that score factors in kills and other useful activities, why is seeing <b>others'</b> deaths so important, other than to have something to chastise teammates over? If someone has a score of a hundred, but a 1:12 K:D, that means that they were being useful in a high-risk area. They did die, but they were doing <i>something</i> right... defending nodes until backup could arrive would be a good example where you didn't score a kill, died, but were <b>extremely</b> useful to the team's overall position. But the K:D kiddies would deride the sacrificial defender as a 'casual', purely based on that mindless metric.
Being able to see your own, but not teammates' seems to be a good compromise. Allows those who need that particular ego-stroke to mentally w*nk all they like, without giving them CS-fratboy ammunition to yell at the Gorge who saved their backside from dying 30 more times but never scoring a single kill themselves (and even getting picked off a few times to keep the damage dealer alive).
<!--quoteo(post=1939544:date=May 28 2012, 10:40 AM:name=Not Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Not Flayra @ May 28 2012, 10:40 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939544"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I love how you build that it's purely a rough informational metric, then express how NOT having it is 'casual', effectively calling anyone who doesn't see KDR as a valid/important metric (which it isn't) an unskilled casual (or noob). Effectively destroying the (mock?) argument you'd made, leading up to that point.
Given that score factors in kills and other useful activities, why is seeing <b>others'</b> deaths so important, other than to have something to chastise teammates over? If someone has a score of a hundred, but a 1:12 K:D, that means that they were being useful in a high-risk area. They did die, but they were doing <i>something</i> right... defending nodes until backup could arrive would be a good example where you didn't score a kill, died, but were <b>extremely</b> useful to the team's overall position. But the K:D kiddies would deride the sacrificial defender as a 'casual', purely based on that mindless metric.
Being able to see your own, but not teammates' seems to be a good compromise. Allows those who need that particular ego-stroke to mentally w*nk all they like, without giving them CS-fratboy ammunition to yell at the Gorge who saved their backside from dying 30 more times but never scoring a single kill themselves (and even getting picked off a few times to keep the damage dealer alive).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think removing K:D from the scoreboard will result in a new competition among teammates for highest score. The choice boils down to making "competitive" players happy, or "casual" players happy in some people's minds, but this is a false distinction invented by those who see themselves as a persecuted minority. I think we should look at the universally desirable element of fun and weigh it against other elements that can either coincide with fun or strip it. Are there people who have their experience ruined by seeing a poor score? Do they deserve the negative appraisals they might receive?
I liked the system in Day of Defeat ( the other mod, no not CS :P ). You could get the most kills and least deaths on your team, but a guy with no kills and 3 deaths could top the board with a single point capture ( because everyone else was camping with sniper guns ). You could see how well you killed and how well you avoided death, but it was also visible who was trying to complete the objectives in the game... capture the points.
NS has waypoints and constructions, will be including defend and attack orders so ensure that those give a good score multiplied by the number of squad members present ( get points for obeying instructions , and staying with a group ) .... things like that , rather than making killing stuffz real good the only way to rule the board.
Personally I dont think visible to all KDR adds anything to team based games, and think that stats should only be visible to the player themselves... prevents picking on individuals due to a low KDR.
... as for flashy pop ups each time you kill stuff , have you tried CoD:MW3 ? Or BF3 ? Those have all the pats on the head you will ever need to appease your need to be patted on the head. The only pop up I need is the victory one when I win.
Plenty of times your team working, Killing blow will be shown as kill or getting the point.
This is kinda unfair to those who put in hole mag or 2 into a mob, one run by finish the job and get the reward for it.
Kills should not be based on last hit, but on most damage on the object, or amount of building, one did most hit should get reward for it, the rest that helped should get assistance score.
For example on kill/death ration should actualy be Kill / Assist kill / death, same could be done with constructing and distroying points.
This way everyone get rewarded and those realy put effor in the team work get highest total score, either by constructing, distroying enemy buildings or assisting the team on a strike and if you do nothing you get nothing.
So simple got add assist build/distroy and assist kill.
KB=5 points Assist=3 points Building 10 points (depending on what you build) Assist building 6 or 7 points (dependng on what you help building.) Distroying 10 points Assist distroying 6 or 7 points.
ofc for buildings should depent on how importand the buildings is.
Repairing and healing should also gain points, 1 points per 10% healing/repairing or something.
should make everyone happy, not only those that finish the job when just walking by, K/A/D will be viewed different because assisting your team in killing is just as important.
Should not be hard to implant I think.
though I dont care I just play for the fun of the game.
ScardyBobScardyBobJoin Date: 2009-11-25Member: 69528Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
I'm a fan of the score-only approach, though that's mostly because I like less clutter on my scoreboards (easier to quickly assess the macro situation by looking at the scoreboard and minimap in quick succession). However, if kills and deaths are kept I'd like to see the following: <ul><li>Add structures killed to the scoreboard</li><li>Revise the score system to include the missing important components (mostly assists, healing, following orders, etc)</li></ul>
Also, I think the hesitation with including KDR as a major component in NS2 is that it is an incomplete measure of what you need to do to win. Contrast that with a traditional FFA or team deathmatch game, where KDR is almost, by definition, the victory condition. I don't mind keeping kills and deaths in NS2, but only if better measures of progress towards victory (i.e. score or structures killed) are included.
<!--quoteo(post=1939552:date=May 28 2012, 03:53 PM:name=hampton)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (hampton @ May 28 2012, 03:53 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939552"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I think removing K:D from the scoreboard will result in a new competition among teammates for highest score.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
aka people shoving each other out of the way to finish building stuff like they're stocking up for a hurricane, and never leaving the base to actually play ns2
+1 for removing the point system. build things because it needs to be built. kill things because it needs to be killed. there's no point (no pun intended) in getting worked up over a scoring system that adds absolutely nothing to the game. The only on screen pop up that matters is "Aliens/Marines Win".
Fun to watch this thread develop over the last 3 days.
I am simply going to reiterate my original post: Score is not bad. Statistics like kills, deaths, assists, etc are a good thing. They give you concrete numbers that a player can base their own conclusions off of. I would not like to see these statistics removed.
And honestly, a commander SHOULD see these statistics, as they're the ones who have to pick what players get what assignments.
My simple opinion is that we don't need to see a +1 score every kill. Another option, though, would be to differentiate the points so they are not confused with res. SAY "+1 pt" on scoring, and "+1 res" if you happen to be looking at an extractor. Otherwise use different colors. Maybe use different numbers. Use +100 points as a base instead of +1, so there's no confusion between the two. Killing a cyst? 50 points. Kill a hive 1500, etc.
<!--quoteo(post=1939620:date=May 28 2012, 07:56 PM:name=Deadzone)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Deadzone @ May 28 2012, 07:56 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939620"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Fun to watch this thread develop over the last 3 days.
I am simply going to reiterate my original post: Score is not bad. Statistics like kills, deaths, assists, etc are a good thing. They give you concrete numbers that a player can base their own conclusions off of. I would not like to see these statistics removed.
And honestly, a commander SHOULD see these statistics, as they're the ones who have to pick what players get what assignments.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I'd definitely agree with this. Score, kills, and deaths are all as meaningless in a vacuum, but useful in adding context to a game.
The only reasons I've seen to remove any scoring metric (including kills and deaths) has basically boiled down to: a) People are afraid someone's feelings might get hurt by their (presumably bad) score or deaths showing. b) People don't care about score, kills, or death.
To which I'd say a) get over it, it's a competitive video game b) then don't look at it.
<!--quoteo(post=1939620:date=May 28 2012, 07:56 PM:name=Deadzone)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Deadzone @ May 28 2012, 07:56 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939620"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->My simple opinion is that we don't need to see a +1 score every kill. Another option, though, would be to differentiate the points so they are not confused with res. SAY "+1 pt" on scoring, and "+1 res" if you happen to be looking at an extractor. Otherwise use different colors. Maybe use different numbers. Use +100 points as a base instead of +1, so there's no confusion between the two. Killing a cyst? 50 points. Kill a hive 1500, etc.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I like the popup numbers on kills. It is a simple and minimalistic way to quickly show that I've killed whatever I was shooting at.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The only reasons I've seen to remove any scoring metric (including kills and deaths) has basically boiled down to: a) People are afraid someone's feelings might get hurt by their (presumably bad) score or deaths showing. b) People don't care about score, kills, or death.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Maybe I got another one. When you spectate a game in stracraft 1 you have very little statistics about what is going on, and it's hard to evaluate who's ahead. What you need is game sense, intuition and experience, and you can see when a caster has those for example. This general game sense is something really hard to master. In sc2 you got a whole bunch of statistics in spectator mode, and it kind of spoil the game for you.
So the message is having too much numbers available in game can compete with game sense, intuition and experience. I think it better to keep the players in the dark if possible, in a kind of information fog of war.
<!--quoteo(post=1939695:date=May 29 2012, 04:58 AM:name=Yuuki)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Yuuki @ May 29 2012, 04:58 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939695"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Maybe I got another one. When you spectate a game in stracraft 1 you have very little statistics about what is going on, and it's hard to evaluate who's ahead. What you need is game sense, intuition and experience, and you can see when a caster has those for example. This general game sense is something really hard to master. In sc2 you got a whole bunch of statistics in spectator mode, and it kind of spoil the game for you.
So the message is having too much numbers available in game can compete with game sense, intuition and experience. I think it better to keep the players in the dark if possible, in a kind of information fog of war.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That's definitely a valid point, but I think it's taking the information blackout a step further than is traditional in FPS. Most every FPS game has kills, deaths, and usually some kind of score. An RTS is a different game genre, exactly like an MMO where you always see the health of your opponents. Just because a different gametype has a different information mechanic, doesn't mean that it should be applied to NS2 as an fps.
<!--quoteo(post=1939307:date=May 27 2012, 05:17 PM:name=Yuuki)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Yuuki @ May 27 2012, 05:17 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939307"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->There is a fundamental problem with trying to assign <i>quantitative</i> scores in games, like "this action reward X points, this action Y points".
The only way it can succeed, is if the game is very simple and the dev's can "figure it out" completely. This should, hopefully, be impossible with ns2.
So what we get is score that don't reflect correctly the meaning of their actions to the players.
I think having non-quantitative scores would be better, that is +1 for any action (killing skulk, killing onos or hive = +1). Also not in the center of the screen...<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You are contradicting your self here, aren't you? Assuming we want to reflect the meaning of the actions of the players a quantitative method is the only way to do it. If we now use a non-quantitive score the reflection of the actions is even worse then with so-so balanced quantitative score. I don't really see the point of a non-quantitative system, it makes much less sense.
>Assuming we want to reflect the meaning of the actions of the players a quantitative method is the only way to do it.
You don't want to reflect the meaning to the players, they know much better than the game what the different actions means to them. The scoring is more about forcing certain meaning on actions, specially to new players. It's supposed to teach them the game (quicker? can't remember my machine learning course:) by giving them small rewards constantly instead of one big reward at the end of the game (win/loss).
But the reward system can only be wrong, at least I hope it will be. Also some actions are context dependent, e.g. killing a hive can go from meaningless from critical depending on the game situation, so the scoring cannot always right (also I think killing a skulk should give more points that killing a hive).
would be awesome if there was a way to let the players evaluate each other but i can't think of anything that would not distract from the game... it should remain a low priority after all.
i think the current system is okay, but as many people have stated there needs to be some more tweaking. there could be a lot of fine-tuning up to a point where people don't have time to think about all the possible ways to get score, eventually only caring about the greater good while having faith that this behaviour will also get them the highest possible score.
personally, i'd prefer more team/squad based rewards: <b>e.g. even after you die, you still get some points if the building/lifeform you have just damaged is destroyed/killed within X seconds.</b> so if a whole team attacks a hive, the last survivor might get some bonus for dealing the finishing blow, but the rest of the squad also gets some points (damage related?). building could be similar: you get some static points for finishing a building (and i think everyone who is helping during that moment should get those, not just one) as well as some bonus depending on how much you contributed. i'd also like to see something like L4D's cover-system: <b>some reward for saving teammate from damage/death</b>. this would also encourage teamplay in terms of squad based movement.
oh and +1 for adapting scores for powernodes depending on the amount (or value) of attached structures. some rewards for the gorge seem necessary too.
i'm not a fan of KD, but i don't mind keeping it as long as the score remains as well. however, it would be nice to add "assists" then.
<!--quoteo(post=1939733:date=May 29 2012, 08:30 AM:name=fanatic)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (fanatic @ May 29 2012, 08:30 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939733"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Wouldn't it be awesome if we could stop wasting time on this, and instead talk about the roughtly nine thousand actual issues the game currently has?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> I forgot this was a forum; where you can actually talk about all nine thousand problems in basically one-space.
I would like to see more from the overall-score like the mentioned building kills. The only time I've ever noticed problems with the Kill/Death ratio was when a commander went and said, 'Damn this team is all bad; why can't you kill like [insert player-name.]' Don't get rid of k/d-scoring, but add a bit more to it.
Kills and deaths and assists, and points are all good statistics that vary in importance depending on the game. And each game accounts for this! TF2 has a throng of statistics, and shows a specific subset to all players but only you get to see all your stats at the bottom of the scoreboard. Tribes: Ascend doesn't show deaths, because deaths don't really matter at all in that game. Deaths are super important in a game like dota, so those definitely have to be shown.
In NS2, I'd say that deaths are not very important. Kills are great because they show that you're pushing back the enemy team. Points are good because they show how you're helping the team and building things and destroying things. Assists would be useful in the same way kills are. It's very similar to statistics in TF2, actually - but in TF2 they show deaths because it's a traditional FPS stat. The problem, though, with not including deaths, is that it might be difficult to discern someone who's been on the server for 2 minutes and is 1-0 and someone who's been playing for 10 minutes and is 1-10. In this way, <i>points per minute</i> is the most important stat in the game (and the same holds true for TF2). Of course, this relies on a balanced point model to appropriately distribute points for a wide variety of actions. This can be linked to gold/min and exp/min in dota which are often a good indicator of performance (though they usually align with k/d/a). Points per minute is also great to use for longer-term performance measurements, since you otherwise can't compare score for someone who has played 100 games vs someone who has played 80.
At this stage I think the most important thing is establishing a great score system (along with, perhaps, score for commanders?). Healing and assists are the two major failings of the current stats that I can think of off the top of my head.
Overall, for the scoreboard, I'd say [score-kills-assists] (as in Tribes) in an unsorted list (promotes less scorewhoring to be at the top, but still gives everyone access to see how they're doing) followed by only your stats at the bottom (including deaths, healing, buildings build/destroyed, etc). At the end of the game, I'd like to see a brief scoreboard shown that includes a sorted list of points per minute along with points, kills, deaths, and assists.
Comments
People point to the K:D ratio as some indicator of skill, but the problem is it doesn't quantify -what- skill is being shown. If you're a gorge and your K:D ratio shows 10:1, it's probably because you placed your hydras well and healed them often. If it's a marine, it could be good aim - or it could be that you're good at hiding behind other meatshields and finishing off wounded skulks.
I'd propose a few categories, such as:
- Builder (somehow related to seconds spent building structures, and structures completed)
- Attacker (related to how many direct kills you got by yourself, or perhaps more related to accuracy)
- Support (related to how many kill assists you got, perhaps also seconds spent welding / repairing or healing as gorge)
- Scout (related to how many meters you physically moved, or rooms you visited, or something that shows you are good at keeping moving)
etc.
i am not a score ###### but i wont to now what god i have done in a game and compared to my team/enemy team..
And on some pub server it help to make some team so its not one team lose all the time :)
i am not a score ###### but i wont to now what god i have done in a game and compared to my team/enemy team..
And on some pub server it help to make some team so its not one team lose all the time :)<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
yo why don't you fix your spelling and grammar before you go around calling people retarded, mmk?
That said, a good scoreboard should have:
Score (arbitrary based on various metrics such as damage to buildings, damage to players, buildings destroyed, lifeforms/players killed, etc)
Kills (very important, despite some people apparently thinking they're meaningless)
Deaths (not as important, but more information is never bad)
Do not remove kills and deaths from the scoreboard. That's incredibly casual nonsense for a supposedly skill-based FPS game.
The purpose of the points should be to motivate correct behaviour - be that killing enemies, not dying, building rts, killing rts, healing etc.
During the course of a round the only thing that ideally would be displayed is score - the aggregate of everything you did to contribute to the benefit of your team.
At the end of the round, a very detailed breakdown of every player's stats should be displayed to allow people to understand what they contributed on an individual level and to feel that they are making progress on areas they personally care about.
Having said that, I'd much prefer the current system than removing k:d ratio completely.
Bad players treat score, kills, and deaths as a goal.
Good players use score, kills, and deaths as information.
When you drill down into what makes a good NS player there are far too many stats to display on the scoreboard. The critical requirement is to have a very sophisticated scoring system that can measure concepts like assisting a commander in building an RT ( e.g. you were within X distance of the RT when combat occured and an rt was successfully built ). With a well designed system you can have an aggregate score that more accurately reflects what a useful team member does and k:d ratio then becomes less important. This is probably not achievable within the timeframe of NS2 1.0 but I guess what I would like to see is a mechanism that makes k:d redundant as a useful metric during the game.
I love how you build that it's purely a rough informational metric, then express how NOT having it is 'casual', effectively calling anyone who doesn't see KDR as a valid/important metric (which it isn't) an unskilled casual (or noob). Effectively destroying the (mock?) argument you'd made, leading up to that point.
Given that score factors in kills and other useful activities, why is seeing <b>others'</b> deaths so important, other than to have something to chastise teammates over? If someone has a score of a hundred, but a 1:12 K:D, that means that they were being useful in a high-risk area. They did die, but they were doing <i>something</i> right... defending nodes until backup could arrive would be a good example where you didn't score a kill, died, but were <b>extremely</b> useful to the team's overall position. But the K:D kiddies would deride the sacrificial defender as a 'casual', purely based on that mindless metric.
Being able to see your own, but not teammates' seems to be a good compromise.
Allows those who need that particular ego-stroke to mentally w*nk all they like, without giving them CS-fratboy ammunition to yell at the Gorge who saved their backside from dying 30 more times but never scoring a single kill themselves (and even getting picked off a few times to keep the damage dealer alive).
Given that score factors in kills and other useful activities, why is seeing <b>others'</b> deaths so important, other than to have something to chastise teammates over? If someone has a score of a hundred, but a 1:12 K:D, that means that they were being useful in a high-risk area. They did die, but they were doing <i>something</i> right... defending nodes until backup could arrive would be a good example where you didn't score a kill, died, but were <b>extremely</b> useful to the team's overall position. But the K:D kiddies would deride the sacrificial defender as a 'casual', purely based on that mindless metric.
Being able to see your own, but not teammates' seems to be a good compromise.
Allows those who need that particular ego-stroke to mentally w*nk all they like, without giving them CS-fratboy ammunition to yell at the Gorge who saved their backside from dying 30 more times but never scoring a single kill themselves (and even getting picked off a few times to keep the damage dealer alive).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think removing K:D from the scoreboard will result in a new competition among teammates for highest score. The choice boils down to making "competitive" players happy, or "casual" players happy in some people's minds, but this is a false distinction invented by those who see themselves as a persecuted minority. I think we should look at the universally desirable element of fun and weigh it against other elements that can either coincide with fun or strip it. Are there people who have their experience ruined by seeing a poor score? Do they deserve the negative appraisals they might receive?
You could see how well you killed and how well you avoided death, but it was also visible who was trying to complete the objectives in the game... capture the points.
NS has waypoints and constructions, will be including defend and attack orders so ensure that those give a good score multiplied by the number of squad members present ( get points for obeying instructions , and staying with a group ) .... things like that , rather than making killing stuffz real good the only way to rule the board.
Personally I dont think visible to all KDR adds anything to team based games, and think that stats should only be visible to the player themselves... prevents picking on individuals due to a low KDR.
... as for flashy pop ups each time you kill stuff , have you tried CoD:MW3 ? Or BF3 ? Those have all the pats on the head you will ever need to appease your need to be patted on the head.
The only pop up I need is the victory one when I win.
Though you should have assistand kills in it.
Plenty of times your team working, Killing blow will be shown as kill or getting the point.
This is kinda unfair to those who put in hole mag or 2 into a mob, one run by finish the job and get the reward for it.
Kills should not be based on last hit, but on most damage on the object, or amount of building, one did most hit should get reward for it, the rest that helped should get assistance score.
For example on kill/death ration should actualy be Kill / Assist kill / death, same could be done with constructing and distroying points.
This way everyone get rewarded and those realy put effor in the team work get highest total score, either by constructing, distroying enemy buildings or assisting the team on a strike and if you do nothing you get nothing.
So simple got add assist build/distroy and assist kill.
KB=5 points
Assist=3 points
Building 10 points (depending on what you build)
Assist building 6 or 7 points (dependng on what you help building.)
Distroying 10 points
Assist distroying 6 or 7 points.
ofc for buildings should depent on how importand the buildings is.
Repairing and healing should also gain points, 1 points per 10% healing/repairing or something.
should make everyone happy, not only those that finish the job when just walking by, K/A/D will be viewed different because assisting your team in killing is just as important.
Should not be hard to implant I think.
though I dont care I just play for the fun of the game.
<ul><li>Add structures killed to the scoreboard</li><li>Revise the score system to include the missing important components (mostly assists, healing, following orders, etc)</li></ul>
Also, I think the hesitation with including KDR as a major component in NS2 is that it is an incomplete measure of what you need to do to win. Contrast that with a traditional FFA or team deathmatch game, where KDR is almost, by definition, the victory condition. I don't mind keeping kills and deaths in NS2, but only if better measures of progress towards victory (i.e. score or structures killed) are included.
aka people shoving each other out of the way to finish building stuff like they're stocking up for a hurricane, and never leaving the base to actually play ns2
I am simply going to reiterate my original post:
Score is not bad. Statistics like kills, deaths, assists, etc are a good thing. They give you concrete numbers that a player can base their own conclusions off of. I would not like to see these statistics removed.
And honestly, a commander SHOULD see these statistics, as they're the ones who have to pick what players get what assignments.
My simple opinion is that we don't need to see a +1 score every kill.
Another option, though, would be to differentiate the points so they are not confused with res. SAY "+1 pt" on scoring, and "+1 res" if you happen to be looking at an extractor. Otherwise use different colors.
Maybe use different numbers. Use +100 points as a base instead of +1, so there's no confusion between the two. Killing a cyst? 50 points. Kill a hive 1500, etc.
I am simply going to reiterate my original post:
Score is not bad. Statistics like kills, deaths, assists, etc are a good thing. They give you concrete numbers that a player can base their own conclusions off of. I would not like to see these statistics removed.
And honestly, a commander SHOULD see these statistics, as they're the ones who have to pick what players get what assignments.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I'd definitely agree with this. Score, kills, and deaths are all as meaningless in a vacuum, but useful in adding context to a game.
The only reasons I've seen to remove any scoring metric (including kills and deaths) has basically boiled down to:
a) People are afraid someone's feelings might get hurt by their (presumably bad) score or deaths showing.
b) People don't care about score, kills, or death.
To which I'd say
a) get over it, it's a competitive video game
b) then don't look at it.
<!--quoteo(post=1939620:date=May 28 2012, 07:56 PM:name=Deadzone)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Deadzone @ May 28 2012, 07:56 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1939620"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->My simple opinion is that we don't need to see a +1 score every kill.
Another option, though, would be to differentiate the points so they are not confused with res. SAY "+1 pt" on scoring, and "+1 res" if you happen to be looking at an extractor. Otherwise use different colors.
Maybe use different numbers. Use +100 points as a base instead of +1, so there's no confusion between the two. Killing a cyst? 50 points. Kill a hive 1500, etc.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I like the popup numbers on kills. It is a simple and minimalistic way to quickly show that I've killed whatever I was shooting at.
a) People are afraid someone's feelings might get hurt by their (presumably bad) score or deaths showing.
b) People don't care about score, kills, or death.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Maybe I got another one. When you spectate a game in stracraft 1 you have very little statistics about what is going on, and it's hard to evaluate who's ahead. What you need is game sense, intuition and experience, and you can see when a caster has those for example. This general game sense is something really hard to master. In sc2 you got a whole bunch of statistics in spectator mode, and it kind of spoil the game for you.
So the message is having too much numbers available in game can compete with game sense, intuition and experience. I think it better to keep the players in the dark if possible, in a kind of information fog of war.
So the message is having too much numbers available in game can compete with game sense, intuition and experience. I think it better to keep the players in the dark if possible, in a kind of information fog of war.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That's definitely a valid point, but I think it's taking the information blackout a step further than is traditional in FPS. Most every FPS game has kills, deaths, and usually some kind of score. An RTS is a different game genre, exactly like an MMO where you always see the health of your opponents. Just because a different gametype has a different information mechanic, doesn't mean that it should be applied to NS2 as an fps.
The only way it can succeed, is if the game is very simple and the dev's can "figure it out" completely. This should, hopefully, be impossible with ns2.
So what we get is score that don't reflect correctly the meaning of their actions to the players.
I think having non-quantitative scores would be better, that is +1 for any action (killing skulk, killing onos or hive = +1). Also not in the center of the screen...<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You are contradicting your self here, aren't you? Assuming we want to reflect the meaning of the actions of the players a quantitative method is the only way to do it. If we now use a non-quantitive score the reflection of the actions is even worse then with so-so balanced quantitative score.
I don't really see the point of a non-quantitative system, it makes much less sense.
You don't want to reflect the meaning to the players, they know much better than the game what the different actions means to them. The scoring is more about forcing certain meaning on actions, specially to new players. It's supposed to teach them the game (quicker? can't remember my machine learning course:) by giving them small rewards constantly instead of one big reward at the end of the game (win/loss).
But the reward system can only be wrong, at least I hope it will be. Also some actions are context dependent, e.g. killing a hive can go from meaningless from critical depending on the game situation, so the scoring cannot always right (also I think killing a skulk should give more points that killing a hive).
i think the current system is okay, but as many people have stated there needs to be some more tweaking. there could be a lot of fine-tuning up to a point where people don't have time to think about all the possible ways to get score, eventually only caring about the greater good while having faith that this behaviour will also get them the highest possible score.
personally, i'd prefer more team/squad based rewards: <b>e.g. even after you die, you still get some points if the building/lifeform you have just damaged is destroyed/killed within X seconds.</b> so if a whole team attacks a hive, the last survivor might get some bonus for dealing the finishing blow, but the rest of the squad also gets some points (damage related?).
building could be similar: you get some static points for finishing a building (and i think everyone who is helping during that moment should get those, not just one) as well as some bonus depending on how much you contributed.
i'd also like to see something like L4D's cover-system: <b>some reward for saving teammate from damage/death</b>. this would also encourage teamplay in terms of squad based movement.
oh and +1 for adapting scores for powernodes depending on the amount (or value) of attached structures.
some rewards for the gorge seem necessary too.
i'm not a fan of KD, but i don't mind keeping it as long as the score remains as well. however, it would be nice to add "assists" then.
I forgot this was a forum; where you can actually talk about all nine thousand problems in basically one-space.
I would like to see more from the overall-score like the mentioned building kills. The only time I've ever noticed problems with the Kill/Death ratio was when a commander went and said, 'Damn this team is all bad; why can't you kill like [insert player-name.]' Don't get rid of k/d-scoring, but add a bit more to it.
In NS2, I'd say that deaths are not very important. Kills are great because they show that you're pushing back the enemy team. Points are good because they show how you're helping the team and building things and destroying things. Assists would be useful in the same way kills are. It's very similar to statistics in TF2, actually - but in TF2 they show deaths because it's a traditional FPS stat. The problem, though, with not including deaths, is that it might be difficult to discern someone who's been on the server for 2 minutes and is 1-0 and someone who's been playing for 10 minutes and is 1-10. In this way, <i>points per minute</i> is the most important stat in the game (and the same holds true for TF2). Of course, this relies on a balanced point model to appropriately distribute points for a wide variety of actions. This can be linked to gold/min and exp/min in dota which are often a good indicator of performance (though they usually align with k/d/a). Points per minute is also great to use for longer-term performance measurements, since you otherwise can't compare score for someone who has played 100 games vs someone who has played 80.
At this stage I think the most important thing is establishing a great score system (along with, perhaps, score for commanders?). Healing and assists are the two major failings of the current stats that I can think of off the top of my head.
Overall, for the scoreboard, I'd say [score-kills-assists] (as in Tribes) in an unsorted list (promotes less scorewhoring to be at the top, but still gives everyone access to see how they're doing) followed by only your stats at the bottom (including deaths, healing, buildings build/destroyed, etc). At the end of the game, I'd like to see a brief scoreboard shown that includes a sorted list of points per minute along with points, kills, deaths, and assists.
But I think the solution to this is quite simple, just add a server command where you can choose if players can see their score or not.
So if you don't want players to see the score table you could join a server that hides it.
I would also like them to think harder about what and when they gives points to you for.
It is kind of fun seeing the points show.
But it does seem kind of random.